Do you think there is "good" and "bad" music?

[May90]

This came up quite a few times in various threads, so I decided to create a separate thread for the discussion.

Do you think there is "good" or "bad" music? For example, do you think that this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Tr0otuiQuU
or this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsQGsNiwSHI
or this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3yCcXgbKrE

is an "objectively" better music than this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfVsfOSbJY0
or this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecL4riNr-_g
or this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SEOguApssc
?

[Hana Song]

None of those are good.

[drwelfare]

Some of the stuff I heard I don't know if it can even be considered music. Had a guy who kept going on about how hardcore this rapper was, it was just some guy screaming most of it sounded like gibberish.

[Revi]

Yes, absolutely.

[ranzino]

in the end Beethoven will still be remembered when the "other" 3 songs are longe gone. seems to me there is indeed a sort of difference.

[ls-]

Tastes are subjective. /thread

[May90]

in the end Beethoven will still be remembered when the "other" 3 songs are longe gone. seems to me there is indeed a sort of difference.

This is a good point. A song longevity might serve as an objective factor in measuring its worth, in some sense. Although some great songs unfortunately are forgotten eventually. Especially the songs from the older times. I'm pretty sure in Ancient Greece, for example, there were some amazing musicians, but hardly anything from those times is retrievable nowadays.

[Hawthorne Wipes]

Tastes are subjective, of course. But there are musical pieces that, even not liking them, you can appreciate the work put, or rythim, musicality, harmony, etc..
And plenty of catchy songs you know are shit, but cannot resist to sing.

[Jakisuaki]

"Music taste" is absolutely a subjective thing. It depends on a variety of things from how your brain is put together, what kind of music you listened to during your childhood and a lot more. I wouldn't say there is any "good" or "bad" music in the world. Music is music, however, there is music that the majority would dislike, and music that the majority likes.

[Revi]

Tastes are subjective. /thread

Yeah but tastes are not totally random.. If you asked a bunch of people who was the greater song writer; Bob Dylan or Rebecca Black? You'd not see a 50-50 split as if taste is unknowable and totally unpredictable.

It's not objective, but through peoples preferences and knowledge of music we can quite confidently say some music is better and some is worse.

[nextormento]

Given the arbitrary nature of communication, there's nothing inherently good or bad, better or worse.
But we do measure them through various scales, and we do prop up informed authorities on the field. Furthermore, different cultures have independently developed a taste for similar things. Taste may be subject to the interpreter, but the interpreter is subject to culturally/socially agreed customs. Pretending we can't objectively arbiter taste, within the implicit limits of arbitration, is silly.

[klogaroth]

Most people can tell the difference between "these are the three singles" and "now let's just knock out 7 album tracks".

Regardless of taste.

[May90]

Yeah but tastes are not totally random.. If you asked a bunch of people who was the greater song writer; Bob Dylan or Rebecca Black? You'd not see a 50-50 split as if taste is unknowable and totally unpredictable.

It's not objective, but through peoples preferences and knowledge of music we can quite confidently say some music is better and some is worse.

To be fair, an opinion being popular doesn't make it into some kind of objective truth. In fact, some of the music the majority nowadays considers to be incredible was quite marginal at the time it was played. Ornett Coleman today is considered to be one of the best free jazzists ever to exist by almost all free jazz fans, but back in his days he could barely find any opportunities to perform, because no one understood his music and everyone considered him to be just unable to play his instrument properly.

I would say music objectively differs in complexity. Like, Miles Davis' "So What" is apparently more complex and rich from the musical theory point of view than Rebecca Black's "Friday". Does it make it a better song overall though? I'd say it depends on the person, on what they look for in the music they listen to.

[mrgreenthump]

Ofc there is good and bad music, just good or bad is an opinion of a certain individual. What I consider to be bad music when parts of the track don't make sense with other parts, transitions being bad, singing being inconsistent etc(autotune kind fixs it, but also takes all the emotion away from the voice of the singer).

That doesn't mean a badly made song/track sounds bad to all or a well made track sounds awesome to everyone. Mostly it turns out that way, but it becomes down to preference at that point.

And that brings us down to styles/genres of music and some people are genre focused.. Anything not in their genre is automaticly bad for them, they might even dislike something that it universally liked, just because their preference is so far at the other direction they've basically rewired their brain to like different kind of sounds.

That brings us up to the thing that makes everything I've said totally irrelevant. Because even if you don't like some type of music to begin with, being forced to listen it again and again, you start to pick patterns in it and it "pleasures" your brain basically making you feel good about something that for 99% is pure shit. Now take modern pop music for example, for those not really listening to it, it sounds pretty meh. But then you have these people who are told it is awesome, they listen to it again and again, their friends listen to it, radio plays it, something that really never should have even published comes number 1 hit for some times or even stay on like a weird looking mole that you never get looked at before it's too late.

So yea, music is music. It is art, it stirs up emotions in a person, people like different stuff, mostly people want to feel good, but it's down to your brain and how it is wired to determine what makes you feel good.

In the end you can rate it based on many technical things and your preference, but in the end it doesn't mean anything, because everyone is different. You can't really be universally objective about music.

[justflayin]

It's totally your opinion. Even things that can be measured are subjective to some because of the fluidity of music. Things like tone and cadence for example.

[Auxora]

It's say at least for music from professional musicians and bands it's all subjective. There are the joke YouTube videos or 3 year-olds banging on a can and imo that is more just making noise than music. Just like other art forms like paintings, sculptures, movies, and even books it's all up to the individual if it's good or bad.

[AeneasBK]

No. There are good and bad songs though. There are good and bad dance tracks. There is good and bad hip hop, etc. etc.

[NineSpine]

Yeah but tastes are not totally random.. If you asked a bunch of people who was the greater song writer; Bob Dylan or Rebecca Black? You'd not see a 50-50 split as if taste is unknowable and totally unpredictable.

It's not objective, but through peoples preferences and knowledge of music we can quite confidently say some music is better and some is worse.

Better =/= More Popular. Those don't mean the same thing.

[NineSpine]

All styles of music has good and bad examples. Apart from metal, that's all awful.

Metal includes some of the most technically accomplished music made in the last fifty years.

[Grimbold21]

Well i couldnt get through the first season of the tv show "Empire" cause of the music. Does that answer your question?